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Clinton urges restraint and dialogue

United States President Bill Clinton has advised 'restraint and dialogue' for India and Pakistan, believing that their absence would result in incidents like yesterday's downing of a Pakistani maritime patrol aircraft.

White House deputy press secretary Barry Toiv yesterday gave the president's view when asked about Clinton's level of concern on the shooting down of the aircraft.

''Well, as I said earlier, the president believes that restraint, dialogue must carry the day, that any additional absence of dialogue is only going to allow for these kinds of incidents to arise,'' Toiv added.

He, however, said, ''I don't want to express undue alarm here. It's obviously an unfortunate incident. But really, what we have to do is look forward to getting back to the Lahore process. The president is being kept informed by Sandy Burger, his national security advisor.''

When asked about the possible impact of such incidents on Clinton's ''plans of possible travel to the region,'' the other deputy White House press secretary David Leavy said, ''well, the president, as you remember when Prime Minister Sharief was here on July 4, made his intention known that he does want to travel to the region. I don't have any dates for you. But I don't think the latest incident today will impact those plans. He believes that it is important to go. We have a lot of interest, irrespective of the latest conflict, with both countries. The president wants to go and I think it's his intention to go.''

The Clinton administration has also hinted at the possibility of despatching emissaries to New Delhi and Islamabad to defuse the new tension in the region.

''We have in the past sent emissaries to both (countries) to make this point and if we believe it will be useful, we will do so in the future,'' Pentagon spokesman Kenneth Bacon said yesterday when asked about possible new US initiatives in the wake of the latest development in the region.

Earlier, state department spokesman James Rubin said the US had, at this point of time, no role to play in this situation. Nor did Secretary of State Madeleine Albright plan making phone calls to the leaders of the two countries.

''Right now, the appropriate thing to do is to get the facts, and we don't have all the facts,'' Rubin added.

At the White House briefing, when asked whether Sandy Burger was going to call Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee and his Pakistani counterpart Nawaz Sharief to covey the United States' unhappiness at the latest development, its Barry Toiv said, ''well, our embassies in both countries are carrying that message.''

UNI

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